Education

Overview

The Landmark team, from silks to juniors, advise and represent a wide range of organisations who provide education or who are involved in its organisation, including the Department for Education, local authorities and educational institutions; as well as parents, children, students and staff within the education system.

Landmark’s barristers act in the full spectrum of education cases: admissions, exclusions, administration and governance of nurseries, schools and academies; the provision of education and services to those with disabilities and special educational needs; to admissions, expulsions and service provision whilst at universities. We also advise on governance, structure and administration issues arising at education facilities and for educational institutions.

Education law is hugely diverse and members of the team have been involved in recent high-profile cases concerning:

• Ofsted inspections
• Accreditation of teacher training providers
• Student finance
• Whether the lack of damages available in a claim for discrimination by a child against a school it itself discriminatory
• Issues arising from the pandemic, including a Landmark team acting for challengers to the A-level exam grading
• Issues around academisation and Academy finding agreements
• Inquiry work, with Fiona Scolding KC acting as lead counsel in the residential schools investigation in the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, and Galina Ward KC representing the Department for Education at the Covid inquiry.
• The right of schools to select on the grounds of religious observance and its impact upon socio-economic diversity
• The transport policy of a local authority
• The interface between health, education and social care for those with disabilities
• The legality of OIA complaints procedure
• The exclusion of a child from an Academy.

The strength of the team lies in setting individual pieces of advice within a wide knowledge of the challenges in the education world. We have a hard earnt and well-deserved reputation for approachability and our desire to work in a team with those which instruct them.

Landmark counsel always seek to provide practical solutions to difficult legal problems. They recognise that litigation has to be seen as one way forward, but it is not the only tool. They have extensive litigation experience from the Supreme Court to the First Tier Tribunal and regularly advise central government, local government, charities, independent schools, Academies and maintained schools, quangos, individuals and pressure groups across the board.